We all suffer from frustration, and being able to effectively deal with frustration is very important for self improvement. It can be a decisive factor between success and failure.
Frustration can have highly damaging impact on our frame of mind. It can turn a positive person into a negative person. It can inhibit our progress. We can become so wound up with our own frustration that we can’t even think or act rationally, or we can even become aggressive. There are countless causes of frustration, and what affects one person may have no impact on someone else.
Here’s a very important Quote:
‘Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.’ by Helen Keller
The problem is that we focus on God changing the situation, rather than on the fact that He can give peace, joy, grace, and strength while we go through it. The peace of God is available, but we have to ask for it, receive it, and walk in it.
Still Feeling frustrated? Want to get rid of it? Here are
7 Tips for finding true and lasting inner peace no matter what is going on around you and who is causing it.
Tip 1: Identify what is making you frustrated.
Then think of this: Some people can deal with the very same problem and never get frustrated. So why is it irritating you so much? Take a look at the true cause of where your anger is coming from: Look at yourself! Here are some very common sources of frustration:
• I feel frustrated whenever someone doesn't change fast enough to suit me.
• I want others to improve in order to make my life more pleasant.
Tip 2: Acknowledge your frustration as a sin.
When we are frustrated, our attitude is not very loving, is it?
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, and it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres.
Frustration occurs because we insist that our pain will only go away when the other person shows us they are truly sorry for what they have done.
Love doesn't insist on having its own way. Frustration is the emotional act of insisting that somebody else must do something to bring justice when we have been unfairly treated.
We like to point the finger at other people, because it's easier than admitting the sin of our unloving reaction to what they have done. To overcome this, ask God to help you see them as He sees them, through His loving eyes.
• See the offender as weighed down by bags of garbage (the abuse that's been inflicted on them, the rejection and misunderstanding they have gone through)
• Look past the garbage to see the real person underneath.
Tip 3: Repent. Turn away from the feeling of frustration.
To repent means to change your mind. Choose to accept people the way they are even though you don't like everything about them. What if they never improve? Could you still accept them that way? If they do begin to change, is it okay if they don't change fast enough? What if their lack of improvement or slow growth causes more problems? If you try to repent under your own will-power, you won't get very far. Ask the Holy Spirit to intervene in your life and give you help. God gives us supernatural help!
Repentance also means forgiving yourself for getting frustrated, and forgiving those who are making you frustrated. Be ready and willing to forgive continually and repeatedly ("hundred times or more"), and frustration usually only happens when we are continually and repeatedly offended.
Even after deciding to repent and forgive, the feeling of frustration usually remains. Why? To discover the answer, we move into:
Tip 4: Recognize that your desire for people to change is another sin.
Love means seeing the good in others while not holding their sins (their bags of garbage) against them. Because we do love them, we want to see them become free of their garbage. For their own sake, we wish they'd change, and then we get angry when they don't. To overcome this frustration, we need to stop looking at the garbage. But how?
Tip 5: Learn what is the root of your desire for the other person to change.
Usually, the root is Fear. We're afraid of getting hurt again and so we reach the conclusion: "I should be upset with them for not changing." This really means: "I must hurt that person now because he might hurt me in the future." And so we hurt them by being frustrated with them. They don't even have to know we're frustrated, as long as we feel frustrated, we feel like we're taking some sort of revenge.
In other words, fear leads to disapproval of the other people, and disapproval is not love.
• We're offering conditional love: "If you change, then I will be happy and loving with you."
• The people causing our problems need our acceptance. To give this to them, we need to get in touch with God's love for them.
• When we love them with His unconditional love, they experience God's healing touch.
Tip 6: Discover the true source of your happiness.
Our happiness does not depend on others and how they treat us. We don't need constant kindness from others to feel good. Our happiness depends on how good our relationship is with God. God is our true source of joy, inner peace, calm and non-frustrated spirit.
• We're happy because we're partners with God, making a difference in someone's life.
• We're happy because God will never do anything to hurt us.
• All other sources of joy only last short time.
But knowing this is not enough. The next time a problem occurs, we're unhappy and frustrated again. It seems like we'll only be happy if the person hurting us changes or leaves us alone.
Tip 7: Kill off all illusions about other sources of happiness.
We need to become a sign of the true, loving and healing presence.
Get your eyes off the people who hurt you and look at your own relationship with God, who is love ~ God, whom you rejected when you gave to others your anger and frustration instead of God's love.
Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
A grain of wheat must fall to the ground and die to produce much fruit. Your desire for the unloving person to love you must be nailed and killed, and with that you will be killing the source of your frustrations. Then, you will experience the growth of much peace and joy.
If we love our life we will lose it. By hanging onto your life of frustration, you lose what you want most. In your desire for the unloving person to love you the way you want him to, you focus on what is hurting you and you lose touch with whatever amount of love that person has to give.
We've grown up with the illusion that happiness comes from being right and protecting ourselves from hurts. To find true happiness in troubled relationships, we must embrace these people with love, the way they are and accept them as it is. Stop fighting and offer no resistance.
Do not resist another person. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
The other person might not change, but you will. You will find inner peace and joy no matter how much you suffer. You will no longer be damaged by the hurts inflicted upon you. You will no longer have any reason to feel frustrated!
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other and live a life of love, and compassion.
Do not let life’s frustrations be the downfall of your spiritual walk and growth.
Recent experiences have shown me that people go from challenge to challenge. Some use those challenges to become better, some become bitter.
